A Riverside County lawmaker’s proposal to end the COVID-based state of emergency declared by Gov. Gavin Newsom two years ago will be the subject of a hearing Tuesday in the state Senate.
Sen. Melissa Melendez, R-Lake Elsinore, has made several attempts to secure hearings regarding the governor’s ongoing use of emergency powers, and she said Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, last month finally agreed to calendar her latest measure, Senate Concurrent Resolution 5.
It will be heard by the Senate Committee on Governmental Organization.
“As coronavirus infection and hospitalization rates continue to drop, it’s time for the state to allow local governments to take the lead and to address emergencies locally without the shotgun approach of a statewide emergency,” Melendez said in an introduction to SCR-5. “It’s time we, the Legislature, heed the advice of the Legislative Analyst’s Office to `jealously guard (our) Constitutional role and authority.”’
“The governor has slowly begun to peel back mandates, indicating that the need for his emergency powers is no longer necessary,” she said. “If California truly is in a better place to handle future events like COVID, then it should allow emergency assistance to be determined at the local level.”
On the advice of state Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly, the governor switched gears last month and adopted an “endemic” plan, under which Newsom has rolled back some of the 70 executive orders that have been issued since he declared the statewide emergency on March 4, 2020.
According to a Senate analysis of SCR-5, most of the emergency provisions will be terminated by March 31. However, some will not sunset until June 30, while 30 acts are slated to remain in place without a future cut-off date, meaning the emergency declaration does not have a set timetable.
According to the California Emergency Services Act — Chapter 7 of the Government Code — a governor is required to proclaim that a state of emergency is over “at the earliest possible date that conditions warrant.”
If the governor does not make a proclamation, and the Legislature concludes that conditions no longer justify granting the chief executive broad authority to act unilaterally, lawmakers can vote to end the emergency.
“California continues to adjust our policies based on the latest data and science, applying what we’ve learned over the past two years to guide our response to the pandemic,” Newsom said last month. “We cannot predict the future of the virus, but we are better prepared for it and will continue to take measures rooted in science to keep California moving forward.”
States of emergency were declared in all 50 states at the beginning of the virus outbreak. However, since that time, over half the states have formally ended their emergencies, according to published reports.
Melendez previously authored SCR 93 in the summer of 2020, seeking legislative scrutiny of the governor’s emergency powers, but the measure was tabled without debate. In February 2021, she also submitted SB 448, which seeks to narrowly define when and how future emergency declarations can be made, as well as apply specific limits to their duration.
That bill remains active and has received bipartisan support. It is awaiting additional hearings.
Assemblymen James Gallagher, R-Yuba City, and Kevin Kiley, R-El Dorado, filed suit against the governor in 2020 to prohibit his use of executive orders to create or change legislation, in violation of the separation of powers doctrine. The civil action resulted in a Sutter County judge granting a temporary restraining order.
However, a state appellate court overruled the trial court judge, invalidating the TRO. The matter was appealed to the California Supreme Court, which declined to hear it last August.
In his appellate brief, the governor wrote that his orders were in response to “the most serious crisis in modern California history” and that he had exercised his authority to prevent “uncoordinated (and) haphazard action” that could make matters worse in containing the virus.
SCR 5 cites Gallagher’s and Kiley’s case in arguing for the Legislature to end the state of emergency.
“An open-ended state of emergency, with boundless powers vested in a chief executive, is incompatible with democratic government,” according to the resolution.